Credential Consternation
by Inks Inc
Summary: Losing one's federal identification is bad. Lying about losing one's federal identification, to an ever omniscient Gibbs, is even worse. Warning: Reference to Spanking. Tag to Under the Radar. Tim/Gibbs. Complete.
1. chapter 1

"You're only telling me this now, McGee?"

Gulping with far less masculinity than he would have liked, Tim nodded morosely. "I thought they'd turn up, Boss, I really did. I didn't think having to deal with an IG investigation was worth the hassle when I was sure they were just...just..." His words caught in his throat as the all too familiar steel glint appeared in Gibbs' eye and as Tony suddenly scuttled past them like a crab, hogmarching himself out of the Bull Pen and to the safety that lay beyond. "Let me get this straight, McGee. You lost your credentials, your federal credentials, and you didn't think reporting that loss to IG was worth the _hassle?"_

He glared up at the paling Agent.

"And then, on top of that breach of protocol, you decided to lie to me? You told me that you couldn't come with me to the Pentagon because Abby needed your help down in the Lab. Now, was that the truth or did you feed me a half baked story because you knew you wouldn't get near the Pentagon without your creds and you hadn't owned up to me about losing them? Think carefully before you answer me, because I'm in no mood to hand out second chances here."

Tim dropped his gaze to the floor in shame.

"I lied, Boss. I lied about Abby needing my help."

Gibbs nodded almost thoughtfully, before he suddenly got to his feet. "With me," he instructed brusquely and led the way from the Bull Pen at a gate so furious Tim had to practically jog to keep up. Dread flooded him as images of the much loathed Conference Room and all that went with it loomed large in his mind's eye. He'd just started sitting comfortably after his last visit there and now he was on his way back. It was with great difficulty that he resisted the urge to plead for leniancy. He knew what he had done was so foolish that any attempts to broker a deal would just amount to throwing more disrespect on the badge.

His inner dread was suddenly disrupted as he realised he was being led in a completely different direction than the hangmans walk leading to the Conference Room. Gibbs stopped so suddenly and shortly on the uppermost floor bar one, that he nearly slammed nose first into his back. Blinking confusedly at the door they'd landed outside, one he'd never seen before, Tim raised a nervous brow.

"Boss? What are we doing here? I thought you were gonna spa...uhm, punish me...in the Conference Room...like normal..."

Gibbs pursed his lips and shook his head.

"Oh no, McGee. You're not getting off on this one with just a sore butt to remember it by. Besides, if I recall correctly, you're not long after a tanned behind and it's clearly done you no good. So, it's time to get a little inventive, don't ya think?" He didn't expect an answer and nor did he wait for one as the colour drained from Tim's face in one fell swoop. He jerked his head towards the unknown door.

"In you go."

Tim baulked.

"Boss...what's in there?"

Gibbs merely grimaced and raised a foreboding brow.

"Oh you'll see, McGee. You'll see."

A/N: Little two-shot based off the episode where Tim did indeed lose his credentials and lie to the "all knowing Gibbs" about it!


	2. Chapter 2

The standoff was only ever going to end one way, but that didn't mean that Tim was ready to concede defeat and place himself in harm's way. He glanced at the foreboding and somehow taunting door with a nervous sheen of sweat sprouting on his upper lip. He flickered his gaze back to his unyielding Boss and raised a desperate brow. "Boss, please, what is in there? I've never seen this room before, I don't think I've even seen this corridor before." He paled. "Are there dogs in there? You know I don't like dogs after Jethro…" he paled, "Not that the name Jethro is synonymous with something that ought to be disliked. Not…not that I'm equating you with a dog…. uhm, not that-"

"Take a breath. When you're finished, go on and get your ass through that door."

Intaking oxygen as ordered, Tim weighed the pros and cons of bolting from the corridor, from NCIS, from D.C. to ne'er return. The overwhelming cons quickly pummelled the pitiful pros. He couldn't run a fraction as fast as Gibbs could, despite their age difference. Hardly able to believe what he was about to say, he peeled his lips apart in one last bout of desperation. "Can't you just deal with this as usual? Or better still, can't you just give me a warning and let this go? C'mon, I never lose things. Ever. It was a once off and I swear it will never, ever happen again." His eyes were beseeching pools of green misery as Gibbs shook his head resolutely.

"Not mad about you losing your creds, Tim," he said quietly, "I'm mad about the lying. As you know."

He pointed to the door with a steady hand. "Now I won't ask you again. Get through that door. You've tested my patience enough today and believe me, I'm already disappointed in you. Don't make it worse." If there was one thing none of the Gibbs brood wanted to hear, it was that line. Tim's face and heart fell in tandem as the words swirled around his mind. _I'm disappointed in you._ The Boss' anger was never a pleasant experience. But it was bearable where it was deserved. But his disappointment was something that lanced through the soul and stayed with the offender long after the transgression was forgiven and forgotten. Squaring his shoulders and biting his lip, Tim nodded jerkily and hoping against hope there wasn't a canine circus on the other side of the menacing door, pushed down the handle and after a brief pause, walked swiftly into whatever laid beyond.

His jaw swung open like a well-oiled trap door at the sight that blinked back at him.

Row after row, machine after machine, spectacles after spectacles. The instructor that had been contemplating on walking out and living off the land turned to the unexpected entrants with despair in his eyes. Side stepping a mind boggled Tim, Gibbs reached the raised dais where the man stood and in that moment, was the adult version of the most wonderful Santa Claus to ever have been envisaged. "You can go. Special Agent McGee is going to assume responsibility for this…whatever this is. It will be his in its entirety for the next four weeks. You will leave whatever you have planned for the next month out for him, everything. If you have any other work you would like to be completed whilst you…recuperate, then you leave that out too. He will do it all. If you are unhappy or in any way dissatisfied with the manner in which he does that, then you come to me immediately and I will deal with it. You understand?"

The man, who was only in his twenties, but looked to be in his forties whimpered in relief.

McGee blinked through the gust of wind that was kicked up as the guy bolted from the room.

Turning back to his pale as all hell Junior Agent, Gibbs raised a brow and didn't bother to lower his voice. There was really no need to. "This, Tim, is Leon's creation. You know how he's always going on about fostering better relations with the community we serve…jabba jabba jabba…to improve our reputation? This is one of his brainwaves, if you can call it that. All these, err, students…are the mothers and more likely, grandmothers, of our men and women in uniform overseas. Given these ladies advanced years and that they are people after my own heart, they know very little about technology. Leon thinks it would be just _lovely_ if we could teach them how to conference call with their sons and daughters on tour. This class has been going on for about seven weeks now…"

He tipped his head backwards, pointedly.

"And yet every single one of these ladies remains entirely unable to switch on their computers."

He moved closer into McGee's personal space and glared sternly.

"Leon wanted _you_ to teach them. I, of course, raised hell. I wasn't having one of my people off teaching when he needed to be out working. Leon then wondered if you would be so kind as to donate your free time in the pursuit of education these lovely women. I, of course, raised more hell. Told him you all worked hard enough without donating your free time to boot. But things have changed. Now I think you _do_ need to give a little something back. So, for the next month, this is your free time. This and nothing but this. There is a certification at the end of this programme, assessments to be conducted. You are going to ensure that every single one of these women can not only Skype with their son or daughter, but can hack into the damned Pentagon should the fancy take them. But don't worry, you're going to have plenty of time. Because not only are you donating your _own_ time, you are going to be spending a lot of work time in here, too. You disrespected the badge with your deceitful carry on, so I think you need to learn the value of federal identification. You're going to earn your creds back."

He paused for breath, trying to remain unaffected by the desperately disbelieving looking kid.

"Desk duty. Teaching. Home. And nothing else. That's your life from now until I say otherwise. Might be four weeks, might be four days. It depends. But for now, you're no longer an active field Agent. You're a desk Agent, and the friendly neighbourhood tech-man." He scrubbed a hand across his face as Tim blanched in misery, his eyes screaming for mercy that was never going to be shown. "You brought this on yourself," he said quietly. "If you had told me straight up that you'd lost your creds, your skull would've been stinging for a second and that would have been that. But you didn't, you lied and you skirted. Do you have any idea how _dangerous_ going out into the field with identification is? Both to your life and career? You damned well know better McGee. And you definitely know better than to lie to me, straight to my face or by omission, each is just as bad. Neither acceptable."

He side stepped the miserable looking kid and reached for the door, half opening it and biting his lip.

"Do you think you're ever going to do something so stupid again?"

Somehow, Tim managed to shake his head slowly in the negative, his soul splintering.

Gibbs thawed and reached out to squeeze his shoulder.

"Then do this, learn your lesson and we can talk about parole. Until then, I'll catch you later. Clear?"

Feeling like he would have preferred even the most ferocious of strappings over this most heinous of alternative punishments, McGee nodded his head miserably.

"Clear, Boss."

With an accepting inclining of his head, Gibbs slipped out.

Steeling himself, Tim made to turn and face his class, comprised of around seventy ladies over seventy, but was suddenly seized around the midriff and squeezed without compunction. Celia, a sprightly seventy-three-year-old blinked up at him owlishly, having abandoned that maddening invention of a computer upon spying fresh meat. "Hello, dear," she crooned, "What's your name then? Will you be coming around here often?" Before he could dislodge her, Cathy, a rambunctious eighty-one-year-old suddenly appeared at his other side. Before he knew it, his cheek was in her well-manicured hands, being pinched without mercy. "Well aren't you the cutest thing since Nixon," she purred, "Wont you come down and show me how to ahh….get to _grips_ with my computer?"

Feeling like a drowning man, McGee glanced with a hammering heart to the slightly ajar door in despair. Maybe it was the lack of oxygen, maybe it was the budding anxiety attack or maybe it was just an hallucination…born out of the arrival of Deirdre, an angry seventy-four-year-old who screeched demands about online shopping for discount blue-rinse at him, whilst wailing on him with her faux-leather purse, sending Cathy and Celia springing to his defence….But in the small gap between the door and wall joint, something seemed to move, but in a blink of an eye all was still.

He blinked again.

The doorway was definitely empty.

But he could have _sworn_ he saw a pair of very familiar blue eyes, dancing with laughter.

But no, Gibbs wouldn't find this form of mental and now physical torture, funny.

….would he?

….

FIN

….


End file.
